Lucid
by Rashka the Demon
Summary: Sakura: "I don't feel like a kid when I'm around you. When did that happen?" Kakashi bit his tongue. He bit it very, very hard. KakaSaku Post-Manga AU.
1. I think you're strange, you think I'm pr

**Title:** Lucid  
**Summary:** As the saying goes, "Kakashi is going to the Special Hell." After having a series of x-rated dreams about his former student, Kakashi's life gets a little...complicated.  
**Rating:** M for explicit sexual content. _Graphic_ content.  
**Timeline:** about 2 years in the future of the manga timeline, no real spoilers  
**Comments:** Part 1. This portion of the fic is a dream, and thus one of the characters is extremely OOC. Fantasies are like that; future chapters will not be so OOC. This features Kakashi/Sakura as an eventual pairing.

**WARNING: **This fic contains STRONG adult content in chapters 1 and 4, which occasional strong language in other chapters as well. ** If you do not like mature content, do not read this story. I am not kidding.**

* * *

**Lucid**

_1 - I think you're strange, you think I'm pretty_

_

* * *

_

Fists pounded against his door. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

A pause.

Again, steadily. One. Two. Three. Four. Five.

Kakashi slid his book further over his face, determined to ignore the sound. The mission he'd just spent several days and a great deal of blood on continued to overwhelm his every waking thought, and to that end he was endeavoring to stop having waking thoughts altogether for the next several hours. He hadn't even had the will to make it to his bedroom, not when his trustworthy and comforting couch was that much closer. He figured he'd just lay on it for about a year and let his front door take care of itself.

Knock. Knock. Knock. Knock. Knock. If Kakashi hadn't already killed six people this week he'd have yanked the door open and done this asshole in too.

"Hatake Kakashi, I'm coming in there." Female asshole, and shinobi. Great. He'd just stay on the couch and eventually she'd get the point and leave.

The door creaked—so much for his deadbolt lock—and from his couch he saw the shadow of an intruder fall across his carpet. The shadow moved across the carpet to stop near his couch as a medium-sized body followed it into his tiny, open living room.

"There you are," Sakura said. "Tsunade-sama said you didn't report to the hospital."

"Did you draw the short straw?"

She smiled, and he pictured her with her hands on her hips, elbows jutting out and one foot tapping. "My shift was ending and she told me you were back so I volunteered to leave a few minutes early to check on you. I don't know why you're afraid of hospitals, Sensei."

"I'm not afraid of them," he muttered from beneath his paperback. He hadn't even lifted it to speak to her, choosing to relish the dark cover it provided over his eyes. "And I'm perfectly healthy, so you can just amble on homeward and consider your duty done."

He wasn't prepare for her next comment to be delivered in a breathy whisper right beside his ear. "Kakashi-sensei," Sakura murmured. "You know I can't leave until I've given you a complete physical. Take your clothes off."

Okay what the hell? The hand holding the _Icha Icha_ book over his face jerked slightly. He lifted it let his good eye examine the girl kneeling next to his couch. She was smiling mischievously and gently running her fingertips over her neck area, playing with the low-dipping edge of her collar. Sakura was being weird. Very, very weird.

"You don't need that," she said, standing up and tossing his book across the room. He followed it with his eyes, then looked blankly back to her. Weird, weird, weird.

"Okay," Kakashi replied as casually as he could. "I'll read it later. What's going on?"

She flipped her head back, tossing her hair. "Sit up."

The jounin sat up on the couch and examined the young woman before him. She was wearing a shirt-vest thing that covered only about as much chest as a skimpy swimsuit might dare, with fishnet across her stomach and down her arms. Her skirt was so negligible it almost didn't deserve mentioning. She was wearing high-heeled boots, with thigh-high fishnet stalkings just begging for an enterprising set of fingers to slide them down and off completely.

Not Sakura after all, then. Like most kunoichi, Sakura often dressed provocatively, but she didn't dress like a whore. And she would never reach out to start unbuttoning his pants one-handed, like a certain pink-painted row of fingernails was doing right now. Either he had an admirer who liked to play henge dress-up, or he'd finally collapsed from exhaustion after all.

"Kakashi-sensei," Sakura scolded lightly, dropping to kneel between his legs. "You're not paying attention to me."

Her hand dipped below his hemline and circled his cock. He sucked in a breath. "I'm paying attention."

"You never paid attention to me like you did Sasuke or Naruto," she whined, and sqeezed him roughly. Then her grip loosened and her fingers grazed up and down his length like feathers. "But I'm here to examine you. You can be punished later."

Hatake Kakashi felt like his was in someone else's body as he watched Sakura tug his erection free of his pants, holding it up to open air and caressing it with both hands. He leaned back into the couch, lifted his hips, and moaned.

"Sakura," he breathed, voice straining through his teeth. "I was your teacher just a couple years ago. I'm thirty years old, and you're not even twenty yet. You should go home."

"That's just like you, Kakashi-sensei. You're all talk and no...fun." She _licked_ the head of his shaft and the image of sweet, endearing, bubblegum-innocent Sakura kneeling between his legs with her tongue caressing his cock was almost more than Kakashi could handle. He didn't care if this was real or not. He groaned and when his hips jerked involuntarily upward he had the unforgettable sight of watching her lips close around dick.

Fuck fuck fuck. Sakura, little pink Sakura, was sucking his dick. FuckFuckFuckFuckFuckOhGod. Sakura. In his apartment living room, with a body that was not _little_ at all and a mouth that—

"Shit, Sakura..."

She lifted her head to order, "Quiet, _Sensei._ We have to finish your exam," then went back to work at 'attending' to his arousal with her lips and her throat.

"Kakashi," he corrected in between gasped breaths, running his hands over her scalp, watching his fingers comb her bright hair. This shouldn't be happening. This couldn't be happening. He was supposed to be sleeping off his mission, not—

She leaned back and let his cock spring free of her mouth with a slick _pop!_, licking the corner of her lips and grinning like a woman far older. She put her hands on his knees and shimmied upward, brushing his erection from her chest down to her uncovered stomach as she leaned over him. With shaky breaths Kakashi brought a hand to remove his mask, but she stopped him, catching his wrist.

"Leave it on," she commanded, and he obeyed unquestionably. Not only was his subconscious perverted in its choice of partners, it was kinky too. Interesting, he thought as he helped tug Sakura's leather and fishnet top off. His heavy flack jacket and undershirt followed. He pushed her almost non-existent skirt up to her waist, and at this point he was barely surprised to see she had nothing underneath.

"I want you, Kakashi." His hands on her waist trembled. She moved her lips over his neck, his shoulders, talking all the while. "I want to let you inside me. You know I've always admired you, admired how strong and frightening you could be. I want know what it feels like to have you take me, to see everything you keep bottled up just come bursting out."

She climbed up fully onto the couch, legs on either side of him. She was so fucking _close._

"Kakashi, Kakashi." She was lifting her hips, she was so close now, and he wasn't doing anything to stop her. He could feel the heat of her, the brush of her pubic hair against his foreskin, and he wanted—

he wanted—

Sakura lowered herself over him at the same time as he thrust violently upward, and Kakashi woke alone in his bed, staring up at the gently spinning ceiling fan.

It was night, and he could hear the crickets outside his window.

"Well," he said aloud to the empty room. "_Fuck._"


	2. I wanna hold the hand that leads me to y

Opening lyric lines belong to the song "XXX" by Crushing Velvet. You can probably just consider that the theme song, since it's the inspiration for the whole idea.

**Comments:** Part 2. Back in the real world. Things will be less PWP for a while as reality creeps in through the corners, but rest assured: Kakashi still has a dirty, dirty mind.

**Sountrack for this chapter:** Interpol - "Evil"

* * *

**Lucid**

_2 – I wanna hold the hand that leads me to your city_

* * *

The ground blurred in front of him: cement, grass. Wooden canal bridge. More cement. Shrubs and lawns. Street gutters.

It was the sight one enjoyed when walking to the Hidden Leaf's mission headquarters, the slow way of course. Through the Academy district and the street market, past the monuments, even a quick saunter around the interior training grounds because Kakashi would never be on time if he could be late. The Hokage said to report in the morning, and he was nobly determined to show up at exactly eleven fifty-six a.m. He liked to consider it his _ninja way_, though Naruto might not have appreciated his abuse of the phrase.

Besides prolonging the inevitable, the extra exercise helped to begin the preliminary attempts at what would, undoubtedly, turn out to be an excruciating effort to clear his head—which had been keeping itself busy with images of his former genin performing a number of _un_childlike acts. On his bodily person and her own. Kakashi'd spent an extensive conference with his hand that morning getting over the novelty of the idea, and now he was beginning to just wish it would go away.

Far _far_ away because Tsunade's office was where Haruno Sakura spent half her time and if his luck went the way it usually did she'd be there and he'd inevitably spend the entire meeting not looking at her. Not that he looked at her either way under normal circumstances, but she'd never been front and center for his wet dreams before, either.

"Well look at this, Copy-nin Kakashi without his head in a book. Somewhere a kitten must be dying."

Miss Kurenai here _had_ been front and center more than once. Her legs were fabulous and her chest was almost as generous as the fifth Hokage's. It was easy to stare at it when she stood half-blocking the entryway. Kakashi smiled at her under his mask; distraction was a commodity never to be wasted.

"You know I would never harm a kitten, Kurenai, even by proxy." He put an extra lewd stress on the word 'kitten' just for kicks. She laughed, deep and beautiful. Since he met her Kakashi still thought of waterfalls over rocks every time he heard it.

"Sure. But I bet you know four ways to skin one if you ever decided otherwise."

"Five, thank you."

A grin waved him on, and as she headed toward the street, she reminded him over her shoulder that Asuma was counting on him showing up for dinner and please not to let her fiancé drink too much. Figuring the more distractions to be the better, it was easy for Kakashi to nod in reply.

Soon enough Kurenai was gone, disappeared around the bend in the alley, and the headquarters loomed above him. Eleven fifty-two a.m. and counting. Sakura was probably in there somewhere, shuffling paperwork. Bent over a book trying to fill her brain with medical jargon. Maybe she was bent over the book because she'd dropped it on the floor and had to lean down to pick it up, arching at the waist and letting her cute ass hang in the air.

Cute ass?

Well, that was just pathetic, wasn't it. Kakashi snorted and pushed open the double doors.

Inside people milled about, going over the contents of file folders or dodging bodies in the hallway's round-the-clock traffic. The lobby boasted a reception desk and giant display boards of current team listings. The entire place breathed a collegiate, business-like flow, if one ignored, of course, the weapons, masks, and the occasional body disfigurement. He drifted past doing exactly that, having stopped noticing them almost as soon he first stepped into this building at the violent age of seven.

Third floor, second hallway, and right into the Hokage's office: Sakura, Ibiki, and the lady Sanin herself were already waiting for him. Sakura waved, and he nodded coolly. The interrogator didn't wave, but Kakashi nodded at him anyway, distantly curious as to the man's presence but happy to dismiss that curiosity as easily as it appeared. He glanced at the clock, and when he looked back saw Tsunade scowling at him.

"It's eleven fifty-nine, Kakashi. I told you to come early this morning."

"I apologize, Hokage. I had to stop to rescue a friend from a loveless, sure-to-be regretful engagement."

A soft voice murmured "Liar," but Kakashi was being studiously polite in sending all the disinterest he could in that direction.

"Did you succeed?" Ibiki wanted to know. The Copy-nin thought of Kurenai and the dinner date he still had with Asuma.

"...No."

"All the better for your non-existent friend," Tsunade snapped, and thrust out a scroll. "This is your next mission. You have some down time before you have to go, so make the most of it. Sakura can explain some of the salient details. Congratulations, Hatake. Once again you've succeeded in being so late I don't have time for your personal report. There better be six _full_ pages on my desk by sunrise tomorrow."

"Yes, Hokage," he acquiesced. Always the peacemaker, was good old Kakashi. Tsunade frowned at his easy concession, then dismissed it and him as well.

As he walked out, his former student trailing behind him, Kakashi stuffed the scroll into his flak jacket and let his eye glance surreptitiously over his shoulder. All he saw was her short skirt and the fishnet accessorizing. Beneath that flimsy material were legs that just last night had been squeezing his thighs and pressing down on him in delicious ways.

"Kakashi-sensei," she began brightly, "I know the medic you're going to be partnered with, and the Hokage wants me to explain to you the details of the medications and toxins your team is going to be guarding during transport. Some of the samples are extremely delicate. Kakashi-sensei, the floor in here is _not_ that interesting, I know because I stare at it a lot myself. Are you even listening to me?"

_You're not paying attention to me,_ she'd said while practically molesting him in his own home. And that just before going down on his cock like the act was a special new jutsu she wanted to show off.

"Kakashi," he corrected, and immediately regretted it. What a difference a little subconscious fraternization made. He added, "Just Kakashi."

"Huh?"

He stopped when he realized her feet weren't hitting the ground behind him anymore, and turned to look. He was especially careful to stare only at her face, though it didn't do much good because he remembered vividly the way that same face had looked while she licked her way up his chest.

"It's been ages, Sakura," a couple years at best, but that could be ages if you looked at it the right way, "since I've been your sensei." Not that he cared how long it had been, but still. Having her call him by the honorific at this point only added an extra layer of perversion to the already perverted scenario.

"Okay," she answered, confused but smiling in a shy, flattered way. She probably thought he was saying it because he was proud of her, which just made Kakashi want to sucker-punch himself a little. Of course he was proud of her and of course he considered her a valuable fellow ninja. She didn't have to look so fucking _elated_ about hearing it from the horse's mouth.

But maybe that was the guilt talking.

Now at ease, Sakura had started in on a long-winded break down of everything he would need to know before heading out next time. It gave Kakashi time to think about a great many things she would have balked to know he was imagining. Things like the feel of her heals digging into his calves as she rode him up and down, or the hot sensation of her breath under his chin, painting the hollow above his adam's apple with her taste.

Then again, did he even know what she tasted like? This girl talking to him right now?

No, he didn't. He had no idea, he never would, and it was time to stop assuming that the person in his dream had anything to do with Haruno Sakura.

"Kakashi-sensei…Kakashi. Is everything okay?" He blinked back to reality, where the girl in question waited patiently, looking every inch her years in the midday sunlight.

"Yep," he replied, and swallowed his thoughts with a smile that she couldn't see. "Everything's just right, Sakura." To drive the point home—to himself as well as her, and in more ways than one—he reached out and ruffled her hair. She batted his hand away.

"Hey, none of that! I'm not _twelve_."

When statements like this were made the morning after a dream like the one he'd just had, Kakashi felt renewed certainty that fate and the world conspired to make his life miserable. And when he was really making an effort on the noble distance thing, too! His nature didn't exactly fall under the 'nice guy' type by default.

He retracted his hand with comically exaggerated apology, pulled out his _Icha_ _Icha_ novel, and said, "That's very true. Bye, Sakura!"

In an instant she faded into a background of swirling pink and white, and Kakashi happily reappeared on a rooftop somewhere far, _far_ away.


	3. And then I’ll hide and let you find me

**Comments:** Part 3, wherein more little stuff happens, and Kakashi's life continues to sort of _waft _by him. This chapter is shorter than the last one. Also, let me apologize ahead of time for my inconsistent suffixes. And the way I waffle back and forth between words like ninja and shinobi.

**Sountrack for this chapter:** Cracker - "Low"

* * *

**Lucid**

_3 – And then I'll hide and let you find me_

* * *

He was watching Sakura eat. What the hell was he doing here? Asuma. Asuma was to blame for this. Asuma brought Choji who brought Ino who brought Sakura who neglected to mention to him at the Hokage's office that she was meeting with Ino for dinner, and now here they all were and Kakashi was staring at her as she ate. She'd lift one mushroom in her chopsticks, bite the head off, and chew it thoughtfully. Kakashi wondered if he could get Asuma to buy him a beer so at least he could have something other to do than stare at Sakura eating mushroom heads.

He snagged a passing waiter. "Two beers please. One with a straw." Since his new very good best buddy Asuma was paying, Kakashi figured the man deserved one too.

"Make that five," Ino said, and snuck a sidelong glance at her former sensei. The jounin was so used to her he didn't even blink. Kakashi could admire that.

"Ino." Her best friend conjured up a respectable frown. Across the table, shoving a spoonful of rice into his mouth, Choji sent Ino a thumbs up when Sakura wasn't looking, and pantomimed guzzling the whole bottle.

"No worries!" the other girl assured Sakura, "Asuma has it covered. He always gives us one beer if we ask at the right time." The ninja in question took his cigarette out to protest this, but Kakashi stopped listening because his beer had arrived and that was a far more promising target for his attentions.

Sitting on a free full stomach and enjoying the taste of a cold drink, the Copy Ninja took the time to look at something other than his former student, and reassess his mental state. So he had a sex dream about a teenage girl. Sakura was young and hot and he'd seen her punch through a wall the other week—which as equal parts scary and interesting. She wore high boots and short skirts and she giggled when she was happy; who wasn't going to look at that? Kakashi was just a man, and men had illicit fantasies about teenage girls all the time.

"My birthday party is in three weeks, and everyone is invited. Including you Asuma. And you too Kakashi, if you can manage not to be too late."

In less than a month Sakura wasn't even going to be sixteen anymore. Seventeen was a whole _year_ past the legal age of looking.

Ino said something along the lines of, "I can't believe your parents are letting you have free run of their house." Still lived with her parents. That was a sign. Kakashi took another long gulp of beer through the straw under his mask.

The pink-haired kunoichi stole the last piece of chicken before Asuma or Choji could get to it, and said in between bites, "They're gone for the weekend, and they said it was fine as long as it was sparkling clean when they got back. Besides, I think they're going to offer to help me rent an apartment as a birthday gift."

She was getting her own apartment. That's what shinobi did when they grew up. Why was he rationalizing this? A dream was not _looking_. He had nothing to apologize for.

"I'm sorry," Kakashi said. Shitfuckdamncocksonofawhore.

"Huh?" The whole table turned to him. "What for?"

"For..." What he needed was something funny and not at all awkward or sincere. "For missing your last birthday." Dammit, that came out _unhealthily_ sincere.

"Oh that's okay." Sakura smiled breezily. She added, "I think you were on a mission that month, and the Hokage was running me so ragged I only had a small dinner with my family. That's why this year, we're going ALL OUT!" Ino and Choji cheered in the background, but Kakashi was busy counting the months. April, March, February, that thing in November... as a matter of fact he had been on a mission last time. He supposed that was a pretty good excuse, and tucked it away for possible use in three weeks.

Did he want to go to her birthday party? It was a dilemma, but he was leaning toward not. Even if Asuma and the other former genin-instructors went, it would still be filled with kids and Kakashi would probably be so bored out of his mind he'd spend the entire night (thanks to that nasty dream) wondering when it was time for Sakura to eat cake and lick the frosting off her lips and fingers. Would she take dainty bites and make exclamations about preserving her figure, or would she throw herself enthusiastically into the campaign for sugar and eat so fast that bits would get stuck on her nose or chin, where someone would have to reach out and—

He was watching her jaw move again. Fuck.


	4. And take another step into the light tha

**Comments:** Part 4, wherein more dreams are dreamt. I know I said it'd be a bit before more smutty stuff, but I got this great song called **"Drive"** by **Melissa Ferrick**, and it's pretty much one of the sexiest songs I've _ever_ heard. If I were the type to blush at music, this song would make me blush redder than a tomato. As it is, this fic has me blushing quite enough, thankyouverymuch.

* * *

**Lucid**

_4 – And take another step into the light that blinds me_

* * *

The balcony overlooked a good portion of the business quarter of Konoha, and from it Kakashi could see the tops of office buildings, the roofs of houses, and not too far past those the awesome, blank stares of the former Hokages. He stood half-distance between the balcony ledge and a pillar, twirling a kunai idly in one hand and watching the moonlit world prepare for sleep. Something itched at his subconscious with whispers of trees and medicine, but he let it be. He was watching for something, because if he didn't keep an eye out it'd take him by surprise.

Bare arms enclosed his waist, and for the narrowest moment Kakashi considered violence.

"You surprised me." He twirled the kunai again, ignoring the gloved hands moving over his abdomen. The tips of her gloves had been cut off, and she was working her fingers playfully under his vest and shirt.

"Why don't you come to my birthday party?" Sakura whispered against his back. Her fingernails grazed his navel. "It's just a week away. It would make me happy."

He kept his eyes on the village night. His other hand stayed in his pocket. He knew now why he wasn't sure quite what he was doing up here; it was obviously something constructed for the benefit of his libido. Kakashi took in the view, and congratulated his imagination on trying so hard. He also took reassurance that only in his subconscious could she sneak up on him.

"Come to my party," said Sakura, hands inching lower, tickling cloth.

"I can't imagine a stupider thing to do, and you know I'm not stupid, Sakura."

She purred against his neck. She fucking _purred_. And while she did, her fingers were getting bolder.

"Yes you are, Kakashi-sensei. You're just stupid enough, I think, for this." He hissed, and almost cut off his own thumb when he fumbled his kunai. God, her fucking _hands_.

"I appreciate the fantastic sales pitch, but the answer is no."

"But Kakashi…" Through the layers of cloth her breasts pressed against his shoulder blades. "I'll probably be out of my work clothes, in my birthday outfit."

"Pigtails and lace?" She pinched him, hard.

"You know what would be fun, Kakashi?" A hot bath. Real sex with people his own age. Beating someone at something, preferably the kind of something that involved pain.

"No. What would be fun, Sakura?"

"If you participated a little."

Enough was fucking enough. Kakashi sent the kunai quivering an inch deep into the balcony ledge, spun around, and shoved the young woman roughly against the rounded pillar behind her. She gasped, startled, and Kakashi didn't need chakra-enhanced senses to tell that her adrenaline was running high and she was unarmed. He loomed his full height, which was still several inches taller than she was, and stared down at her cocked head and breathless, daring expression.

She wasn't afraid of him. Good.

"Kakashi…"

He dropped to his knees in front of her, and pushed her hips flush against the stone pillar. He tugged his mask down, wrapped up her short skirt, and ripped the narrow strap of her panties as if it were a piece of string.

She squeaked in surprise, almost like he imagined the real Sakura might, but her legs opened as smoothly as a book and he pushed two fingers inside her without waiting to discuss it. She moaned, sinking into his hand like water. He let his tongue graze her clit, and enjoyed the way she whimpered his name.

Kakashi took his time with her. She mewled above him, quivering when he hit a place she really liked, and he categorized every whimper in the dark closet of his mind now devoted to Haruno Sakura. Every gasp she gave when he suckled her sensitive little button went straight down his spine into his groin. When he added a third finger she gripped his silver hair and slid a few inches further down the pillar, held up only by the marble and his slick, attentive hands.

"Oh god, Kakashi," she moaned, and he thrust his tongue further inside her.

He wanted Sakura to come, here in the open night air of the village, where any shinobi on a rooftop could see what they were doing. He wanted to know that he had been the one to make her come, with nothing but his hands and his mouth.

Kakashi wanted Sakura to scream until she woke the city, and then he wanted to make her scream again.

"Oh god, oh god, oh fuck," she cried, curling her palms in his hair. "Oh god, Kakashi, _Kakashi_—"

She screamed.

"Kakashi."

He woke up in a tree.

The caravan to the far border of Fire Country and Wind Country was returning after two weeks, and it was a gray morning forty miles from the Hidden Village of Leaf.

The warm smile of a nameless chuunin medic-nin greeted him, a shadow against the soft dawn glow. The enormous branch beneath Kakashi was rough and his lower back cramped from the uncomfortable angle. Below, two shinobi were waking the camping caravan drivers and in the trees around them he sensed the fifth and sixth members of his team stirring from their watch positions.

"Time to wake up, Boss," said the chuunin. "One more day and we're home."


	5. You see my song is like a haiku

**Note:** Part 5, wherein the reader sighs and shakes their head on Kakashi's behalf. Poor guy's in for it now. Thanks, everyone, for the comments you've left. And thank you for adding me onto your favorites lists, as well. I love receiving reviews, and I welcome reactions, criticisms, or even just your thoughts on the fanfic or Kakasaku as a pairing. I admit, they're my guilty pleasure ship of Naruto.

Someone commented to me about timing, and that if this were two years after the manga Sakura would be more likely to be turning 18 than 17. Hm... that is a point, sort of. Overall though, you can round six months up or six months down. I probably should have rounded up instead, but I'm basically committed at this point. It's a small fact anyway, and not really important. Either way, in future chapters I have Sakura acting fairly mature, as I think that most people living a ninja lifestyle as presented in the show probably grow up faster and are allowed more freedoms at a younger age than regular kids in a regular world. If my Sakura seems more like a 20 year old than a 17 year old, that's why.

**Song for this chapter:** "Between the Bars" by Elliot Smith

* * *

**Lucid**

_5 – You see my song is like a haiku_

* * *

It was almost ten when Kakashi cut lazily through the civilian quarter. His latest mission had been local, easy, and ended with a team-celebratory dinner of the spiciest food in Fire Country, which his stomach was still recovering from. As he walked he breathed in the cool, dry air of autumn in Hidden Leaf, and thought of a girl he had no right to think of.

When he saw the same girl walking across the boulevard from him, he believed for a second that he had fallen asleep over his dinner plate and was back at the restaurant, dreaming. There would be no other explanation for Haruno Sakura to be out wandering at night, alone and striding down the same exact street—her street.

_Her _street.

He remembered now, how she lived in the civilian quarter with her family, in a house with a huge tree and bars on the balconies. It'd been years since he'd seen it.

Drunk on nostalgia, a drug he rarely indulged in, Kakashi jotted over to Sakura. The nostalgic feeling disappeared immediately when he got nearer, overpowered by the fantasy. He knew if he closed his eyes he'd see her pink-painted nails curling around his dick—he took a deep breath and looked over at his former student.

She wasn't wearing pink nail polish; in fact she wasn't wearing nail polish at all. He could faintly see the swirling shadow of calluses on her palms, and in his mind, without his permission, the girly hands around his cock went from soft and smooth to rough and strong. Fantasy-Sakura smirked as she took him into her mouth. The update was not unpleasant.

If anything, it was_ too_ pleasant.

The last thing he needed to do was start basing his sordid fantasy on the real thing; a fantasy of Sakura was forgivable, but fantasizing _about _Sakura—the real young woman instead of the idealized teenage sex-kitten of his perverted subconscious—well that was not okay at all. It lent unappreciated realism.

"Late night?" he ventured.

Sakura noticed him and sighed a hello. Kakashi discreetly let his gaze run down her body from her lips to her thighs, admiring the curves and the hardness in equal portions. Who was he kidding? The sex dreams had taken over his nights completely, and in his subconscious he was already starting to overlap the illusion with the real girl. It was embarrassing, but neither was Kakashi wasn't sure he truly wanted it to stop.

He peered at her closer, picking out her weighted stance, her drooping shoulders. Her hair was oily and in the dim light of the stars and street lamps the pink took on a flat grayish color, like his own. There were dark circles under her eyes, and he could see the edge of her crumpled lab coat sticking out of her backpack.

"You look..." tired, stressed, beaten, older. "Weary," he said at last.

Sakura pushed a sweat-dampened lock of hair behind her ear. She nodded, and they began walking together. She said, "I just co-headed a four hour surgery. No one comes out of those with happy feet. And twice tonight we thought we'd lost our patient."

"You do surgery?" He winced behind his mask when the words escaped. She'd just_ said_ she did surgery. He'd never really imagined her at that professional level, given her age—something Kakashi just happened to be thinking a lot about these days.

Sakura raised her eyebrows, and let any offense at his surprise pass. "As the Hokage loves to point out, every time I work on real people, it makes me stronger in the field. Being a medic-nin is more than just patching people up, Kakashi. Sometimes you have to cut them open first. You should know," she sent him a look that was half admonishing, half sly, "you've had six emergency invasive operations."

He was momentarily dizzied by the thought that she'd read his medical file. That Sakura had the _rank_ to read his medical file, even as the Hokage's apprentice. She didn't wait for him to ask, but continued to talk. As she spoke the shadows from the neighborhood street lights danced around her lips and cheeks, forming the words in time. Kakashi watched each syllable rise and dip across her features, and measured them all.

"I've done minor operations alone before, but this was my third time leading a major surgery as second in command. The first two times were with Tsunade-sensei, and this time it was with Shizune." She hiked her backpack up a little higher on her shoulder, and smiled at him. It was breathtakingly disarming. "If Shizune gives me a favorable report, then next time I'll be the only one in charge of the room."

"Congratulations, Sakura," Kakashi said, wanting her to know he meant it. Though he realized he had little right to be proud of how far she'd advanced, he was. "I've never heard of a medic-nin so young running an O.R., and as you pointed out I've been in one plenty of times. Are you the youngest?"

Unconsciously step back, hold. There was being proud of her accomplishments and that was fine and well-deserved, but was he flattering her openly? Where was his head?

And now she blushed, because he'd given her a compliment she didn't have to fight for. Kakashi wanted memorize the picture of it and then burn the picture so he would never have to look at it again.

"No," she said, and smiled a little more. Awe wound through her tone, and brought with it a thread of jealousy. "Tsunade was doing surgeries at fifteen that I'm only beginning to master. Just thinking about it makes me feel like an inexperienced child, even though it must have been twice as hard for her, because she _was_ a child, and yet she was saving the lives of men and women far more experienced."

His gaze focused as Sakura's red face got redder, dipping her head a little. Kakashi let her talk without interruption, filling his mind with the sound of her voice. Later, he knew, he could imagine it wantonly in his dreams, blending with the memory of her blushes. For this moment he just wanted to see Haruno Sakura like she was—open and generous with her thoughts, stressed from the world but still willing to share with a man she barely knew anymore.

Because he asked, and for no more complicated a reason than that.

"I still feel immature like that around Tsunade-sensei," Sakura confessed, kicking a foot along the sidewalk. "Her work is amazing, and we're only discussing the medical field. The stuff she's done as a field-nin, how she came to be Sannin-level... all of it puts me in awe of her, when I sit back and think about it. And when I make a mistake, I feel like a stupid little kid instead of the Hokage's pupil. Even when I've advanced, or when I succeed like tonight, I sometimes feel that way around Shizune or the other upper level medic-nins, too."

She turned her head to look at him suddenly, dead into the eyes. Her stare was speculative as she tapped the back of her thumb against her bottom lip and said, "I don't feel like a kid when I'm around you. When did that happen?"

Kakashi bit his tongue. He bit it very, very hard.

"Anyway," she shrugged, and kept walking, now looking almost nervously away from him, "When I need to strengthen myself I just remember that Tsunade, Shizune, and all the medic-nin I work with were raised here, in this village, and so was I. Konoha made all of us strong, and we make it strong in turn by pushing ourselves harder, by reaching farther. I love being part of that, you know? Having something bigger than myself to fight for."

"Sometimes," Kakashi said gently, because he knew in his gut that this might be one of the most honest things Sakura had ever said in his presence, "Sometimes knowing that you belong somewhere makes the difference between living and dying. It can give you the strength to make it home at the end of the day, and even if at times you think it's all you have, you know that you'll always have it."

She sighed in return, and Kakashi wondered if she was thinking of the boy who threw that sacred feeling away. But Sakura surprised him again, and instead of bringing up her former teammate, she yawned and said, "Wow, has it been a pretty crazy night or what. And tomorrow I'll be a year older."

"Get used to the feeling," said Kakashi. "It doesn't go away."

"You mean that feeling where the world around you is moving so fast, but you're stuck wading through water. And every time you think you've caught up, when you think you're in control, someone puts another hose in the tank and fills it up deeper, until you can't breathe at all?"

He sucked in air through the thing veneer of his mask. Her appearance, his dreams, the late hour: all were pulling something from Hatake Kakashi, draining his spirit like air from a balloon. He could only stare at the image she made in the night, stopped at the gate of her house. Tiredness had encircled Sakura, but still she waited for his response before saying goodbye.

"Yeah." Her preferred metaphor was drowning, huh? "Sometimes it's exactly like that."


	6. You sit and stare at me until I’m mad ab

**Comments:** And now, for a curtain change.

**Soundtrack for this chapter:** Elastica - "Stutter"

* * *

**Lucid**

_6 – You sit and stare at me until I'm mad about you_

* * *

Strands of light fell through her curtains and, finding no resistant in lace, reached out to tickled her eyelids. Blinking, Sakura smiled sluggishly at the world.

Sakura dearly loved mornings. The good sort of mornings where you woke in your own sheets, not the frightening or cold mornings where you woke in a tent in some swamp cursing a foreign landscape. Mornings like this one: soft, and warm. She smiled in a positively lazy way at the alarm clock. Seven thirty-two, such a pleasant number. Seven plus thirty-two was thirty-nine, like three and nine. Three squared was equal to nine, and three times nine was equal to twenty seven which were two out of the three digits in seven thirty-two. It was nice, and circular, and— "Holy _hell!_"

Haruno Sakura leaped up and tumbled out of bed with the grace of a coma patient. She was half an hour and two minutes late, which meant she had to sacrifice her shower or breakfast. No way was she sacrificing breakfast when she had to train with Tsunade at ten. She pulled on her panties, then quickly did up her leg wraps. Her skirt followed. Finally she snagged a bra from her drawer, pulling it on over her shoulders without bothering the clasp. Like every morning, she then paused to examine herself in the mirror, holding her chest.

Though it was completely normal and the only two boys who'd ever seen her naked probably hadn't noticed it at all, it still bothered Sakura that one of her breasts was just slightly larger than the other. It had been so pretty much since she got a chest at thirteen, to her (and really _only_ her) annoyance. "Grow," she ordered her left breast, and glared at it. After a typical moment of fruitless waiting she gave up, sighed, and threw on a shirt. She smiled at the mirror, grabbed a hairbrush, and bounced down the stairs.

Today was her birthday. Tonight was her party. Today was her _birthday_. She decided to make toast with her eggs, for fun.

"Happy birthday dear." Her mom breezed by, grabbed the second to last banana on the counter, and continued breezing right out the door. Sakura waved goodbye.

"Bye Mom! See you in three days!"

Her father floated past a minute later, and grabbed the other banana. Sakura pouted. "Don't wreck the house in your drunken youthful frivolities," her father mumbled. "And don't do any jutsu after three drinks. In fact don't have more than three drinks."

"Love you too, Dad," she waved. The front door closed, and Sakura munched her toast while dreaming of her own place. A place where no one took the last banana except with her express permission. In writing.

Writing, writing…her surgery report! And the research paper on seals she still hadn't started! And training!

Sakura shoved the rest of her breakfast into her mouth and darted into the open world. As she passed her yard gate a corner of her mind stopped thinking about her job and started thinking about Kakashi. They'd talked last night, right on this street. It was kind of nice.

If you'd asked her a month ago, Tsunade's youngest pupil would have said that she considered Kakashi to be something more than an acquaintance but something less than friend. Just a few weeks before he'd blatantly ignored her right in the middle of the Hokage's office, then out of nowhere asked her to call him by his first name. Before that their non-mission-related communication had been paltry, especially after team seven was officially disbanded. He'd never been a very good instructor for Sakura except when it came to the basics (and to teamwork, of course), but she owed him her life several times over since childhood, so she respected him as ninja despite the fact that he was more than willing to drop her into Tsunade's lap. Maybe some people just weren't meant to be teachers?

Still, the Kakashi she'd met last night had been… pleasant. The poor man listened while she dumped all of her troubles without letting him get a word in edgewise, and he seemed to actually take her seriously. She supposed that made them friends now?

Yeah, that sounded good. They were friends. She could say, "And this is Kakashi. He's my friend, you know! If you take away his pornographic literature he cries like a little baby; it's hilarious."

Grinning to the nines, Sakura jumped to the fourth story window of the HQ building and bounced into her office. She pulled out a set of patient files. The young ninja had barely had a chance to read half of them before she became aware of another ninja in her office.

She looked up to see the man in question waiting in front of her desk. Which was a bit of an odd place for him to be, this time of day. Sakura looked at jounin in confusion, then peered around her office for some obvious explanation. Finding no hint of Tsunade-sensei hiding in the corner with a battle axe, she looked back at him as he stood before her. Then it struck the medic-nin: Kakashi-sensei didn't _have_ a desk.

She had a desk and Kakashi didn't. Even though it was a tiny converted storage room with almost no ventilation, Sakura also had an office.

Copy-Nin Kakashi didn't have an office. How cool was that? It was definitely her birthday.

The thought to strike Sakura next was that Kakashi didn't have an office because he didn't _need_ one; he went out on missions all the time and wasn't required to deal with paper-pushing. That stalled her for a moment until her other half argued back. She went on missions all the time! Sure not quite as often as he did, but she was still an active shinobi in every sense of the word. _And_ she had a desk.

"Hi!" she greeted him, and grinned some more. What was he doing here, anyway?

"Did you get your promotion?" Of all the sentences Kakashi could have replied with, this was not one Sakura had anticipated. Shock stripped her of her voice for a second or two.

"What?" she said stupidly.

"You said that if you got a favorable report from Shizune, you'd be allowed to lead a surgery team."

The language of his speech was processing, but the meaning had stalled in the 'reality' recesses of her brain. "Well, yes—but—I mean—what?"

"I wanted to know, Sakura," he said with aggravating slowness, "if you got a favorable report."

Never mind the fact that it wasn't even nine the next morning—_Kakashi_ was taking an active interest in her career? Sakura's eyes narrowed, her brain clicked onto the appropriate channel, and she took in several details at once. Her notoriously perverted ex-sensei wasn't holding his smut novel; in fact the _Icha Icha_ was hidden well out of sight (Sakura didn't doubt he had it somewhere on his person.) He was not lounging unobtrusively against her doorframe like a cat, or flopped down in a chair, or any of the hundred laid back methods he normally used to occupy space. He was standing directly in the center of her office with his hands in his vest pockets.

He stared flatly at her, anticipating an answer. Sakura gaped.

"I...uh…yeah," she mumbled. Luckily she'd checked already.

"Is there a yes buried in there somewhere?"

"Yes," she said in a clearer (albeit slightly annoyed) tone, and gave him an expectant look from behind her bangs. He visibly shifted his weight from his right side to his left—Sakura had never actually _seen_ him do something that physically obvious the entire time she'd known him.

"Oh," he said. "Good for you."

Was that it? "Er, thank you."

"You're welcome."

"Um..." This whole situation had graduated from puzzling to downright weird. "Was there anything else you wanted to ask me?"

He took a step back, and waved genially. "Nope, just checking in."

"Okay. Well...anytime."

"Right. Bye then, Sakura."

He turned, but she caught him fast by saying, "Hey, are you coming to my party tonight?"

"Sure," he replied after a bare moment's hesitation.

"Really?" Sakura was shocked for probably the eighth time this morning. She smiled wide. After all, they were friends now, right? "Great. I'll see you there then. Bring me a present. And don't be _too_ late rescuing strays or the elderly."

Kakashi gave a weak half-laugh at her joke, then a heartbeat later disappeared out of her office as if she'd merely imagined him there in the first place.

The young woman blinked at the now empty spot in front of her desk, then dismissed the scene and returned to the unattractive but satisfying act of biting the end of her pen. She'd just began reading again when a small but noisy crash sounded through the door from the hallway, as if someone had accidentally tripped over the small metal garbage bin and knocked it into the wall.

Or kicked it over?

She contemplated that for a moment or two, calculating the likelihood. Then she started snickering at her overactive imagination. Sakura renewed her pen-chewing, content in the knowledge that the world was still round and that Kakashi, while he could be positively ridiculous sometimes, was still possessing of _far_ too much dignity to ever attack inanimate objects in a public display of exasperation.

There was another little crash, like someone had picked the thing up and then kicked it again.

Huh. "Must be Anko," Sakura muttered, and went back to work.


	7. And if that’s wrong, it doesn’t matter

**Comments:** You probably thought this would never happen, huh? Well here you go! I had to go on a trip to save the world for a year, but I'm back now and able to catch up on some fic (though I'm behind in the Naruto manga, just so you know, and certain people are alive here that might have died in canon). This chapter is again from Sakura's POV, which means its pretty soft rating. I think I'll stick with her a little longer but I'll eventually switch back to our favorite perv.

**Soundtrack for this chapter:** Blink 182 – "Feeling This", Tears For Fears – "Head Over Heels"

* * *

**Lucid**

_7 – And if that's wrong, it doesn't matter_

* * *

"My money's on Gai," a tall brunette stated, calmly sipping her rum and coke and speaking loudly over the music.

Next to her, Sakura felt a surge of unexpected loyalty. "I'm sure Kakashi-sensei can hold his own."

"Gai's got twenty pounds on him," Kurenai replied with a shake of her head, "and a lot more enthusiasm for drinking games." Before their eyes a circle had formed in the patio crowd, and in the middle were two jounins, known to be eternal rivals. The men were alternating with shots of very cheap vodka, pausing after every four drinks to wait a pre-determined recess of five minutes. They were on their third recess, and the crowd—a collection of young and old villagers that Sakura knew from her genin years and her current hospital work—was furiously laying bets on who would forfeit, vomit, or collapse first.

"Kakashi must have been drunk plenty of times before." The young medic was still finding it difficult to think of her former instructor as being bad at something, even drinking, which hardly counted as a 'skill' in the first place.

Kurenai laughed like she had the most fascinating secret. "Oh yeah, he's been drunk before. He certainly has been _that_." As the woman's mirth settled they heard a sharp whistle, and turned their heads to see Gai and Kakashi slam another four drinks faster than the eye could see.

An hour later, the citrus lay before her in bright clusters: oranges, lemons, limes, waiting to be sliced for shots or garnish. Off to the side there were other fruit: kiwis, peaches, and apples already sliced and ready to be carried out to the waiting masses, with the strawberries on the cutting board before her, lush and red. Cooking relaxed Sakura, and she didn't mind covering the duties of hostess for her birthday party. Periodic trips to the kitchen, which was partially walled off from the rest of the party with a large bookcase, allowed her the chance to take a breath.

She glanced over her shoulder, saw a man through the pink strands of her hair, and did a double take. A smile bubbled up, and Sakura quirked her head at him as she resumed chopping fruit. He appeared at her side seemingly without having traversed the distance; it was an impressive feat with so many people in the kitchen hallway, and most of them shinobi. Now he was safe in the respite of her parent's immaculately neat kitchen. "You made it," she grinned, and elbowed him playfully. "It's not so boring, is it?"

Kakashi held his novel up to his nose. "I hadn't noticed."

Sakura laughed, and said, "I'm sure Gai would protest."

Kakashi tucked the book away and leaned his lower back against the counter. Amongst all the partiers in their off-duty clothing, he reminded Sakura of a heavily armed cat: slippery, with hidden claws. "Caught that, did you?" he murmured. Sakura popped a slice of kiwi between her teeth, and raised her eyebrows. He certainly was chatty since they'd started this tentative friendship. Chatty for Hatake Kakashi, at least, though his was hardly a meter for normal people.

"He is hard to miss, especially when he's challenging you," she replied, and noticed the way his eyes tracked the food she brought to her mouth. His gaze skipped from the knife-tip to various parts of her face. "Thanks, by the way. You won me ten easy ones and senbon needle."

"Happy to help," he deadpanned, still intently staring at her face. The scrutiny was a little unsettling, but then again just being around Kakashi could be unsettlingly. Her former sensei didn't pay much attention to people unless there was a reason to do so. If he looked at you for too long without making a dead-pan comment you'd start to wonder if you had royally messed up some inane little aspect of the training he'd instructed you to perform and he was subsequently going to kill you as punishment, or if he was just plain going to kill you. After their conversation the other night and the awkward moment in her office she had hoped she'd be more comfortable around him, but she felt nearly as peculiar talking to him now as she had before.

Sakura ate another strawberry slice off the tip of her kitchen knife. "How much _did_ you drink?"

"Hmm?"

"Kakashi, how much did you have to drink to get Gai to collapse?"

He waved at the air dismissively. To the young surgeon's sharp eyes the gesture didn't appear as wobbly as she'd expected. "Not the most I've ever had in a sitting. Gai's tolerance is surprisingly low."

However much it was, it had done the job. Sakura cut more strawberries, musing at the inebriated man before her. He didn't display many of the physical tell-tales; it was primarily from his language that she could tell. For one thing, he was talking about something that might have occurred before she'd known him—Kakashi did not normally talk about any personal topics older than last month—alluding to the fact that he'd been drunk before, multiple times, and to a worse degree. The detail was meticulously filed away for her subconscious to pore over later.

"Well, he is Lee's idol," she pointed out, as everyone knew the boy's history with alcoholic reaction. "Maybe Gai just—ow, damn." The cutting board was coated with juice, and her hand slipped, nicking her palm with the tip of the knife. She held up the appendage and examined a dot of blood beading below her middle finger's knuckle joint. Although Sakura could have healed the shallow wound with two thoughts, she instead did a thing she hadn't indulged in since childhood: she brought the tiny cut to her mouth and sucked it, tasting a drop of her blood mixed with fresh fruit juice.

"That's unsanitary," Kakashi said, and she looked up at him guiltily. His eyes glazed from alcohol, he reached out and pulled her hand from her mouth, turning it over until it rested in his own, between them. Sakura watched this happen, a little too startled to pull away or question it. His large fingers, more rough even than her own (and she was no rookie when it came to calluses), cradled her hand and his thumbs gently moved over her palm, rubbing away the drops of blood that persistently welled there.

"Can't you heal this?" he asked, the pads of his thumbs touching every centimeter of the surface of her hand, as if she were a tool and he wanted to test her for polished smoothness. The sensation sent ticklish tingles up Sakura's arm, despite Kakashi's detached and clinical tone.

"Watch," she answered, smiling slightly. He obediently leaned forward, examining her flesh as she sent chakra coursing through her capillaries to the spot on her palm where a tiny hole leaked her strength. She focused the energy, weaving it into tissue until the cut disappeared in a little arc of blue light. Kakashi rubbed the place where it had been, wiping away a streak of red to reveal flawless seventeen-year-old skin. Sakura watched his expression carefully. She had assumed his fascination with the cut came because the alcohol was making him feel morbid and bitter, a temporary funk that more experienced ninja sometimes slipped into, not uncommonly at large, high-attendance parties where things were intended to be cheerful and hopeful.

Calculating the rate at which his pupils continued to expand and contract, the delicate way his hands still caressed her now perfectly healthy appendage, something different altogether crept into Sakura's mind. She said, "All better," and had a warm smile prepared when Kakashi met her gaze. He folded her hand on itself and let go.

"Appalling," he said, putting his fists back into his jacket pockets. He gave her a moon-eyed smile, edges visible behind the mask. "In my day, a decent medic would have grown a new finger."

Sakura laughed out loud, pushing away from the counter and handing him the bowls of lemons and limes to carry out into the party. "You _must_ be drunk, Kakashi, because I already have the traditional number." She grabbed two more bowls and shuffled him toward the kitchen door. Her moments of taking Hatake Kakashi seriously were constantly sabotaged by the man himself. What went on in his head from moment to moment, Haruno Sakura had no idea, and he was too tipsy tonight to make a reliable study.

"One could always use a sixth finger," the Copy-Nin argued as they pressed into the crowd of the living room. "The benefits to one's partner alone are worth a purchase."

"Pervert!" Sakura laughed again, and handed him her party food. "Leave these on the snack table, and go do something fun before you're too far gone to remember." With her mood brightened and a relaxed smile on her face, she left her enigmatic former teammate standing next to the hors d'oeuvres, the crowd swelling to fill her path until he disappeared completely behind her.


	8. I’m gonna climb my way to Heaven on your

**Comments:** Done quicker than I thought! I feel very relaxed and pleased with this chapter. It's kind of filler, but at the same time it marks an important turning point for Sakura. I know that you guys have probably read all the different Kakasaku fics out there, the same ones I have. And so you know how tricky it is to get either character right: Sakura can be the slutty student, the wounded woman, the naïve virgin, the strong and passionate warrior. My Sakura is a little of all of those, and you'll be in for some surprises with her, I can tell you. Look underneath the underneath, and then look some more. wink 

**Soundtrack for this chapter:** Thea Gilmore – "This Girl Is Taking Bets"

* * *

**Lucid**

_ 8 – I'm gonna climb my way to Heaven on your ladder_

* * *

Sakura woke the next day with a headache only half as bad as the one sported by the boy moaning on her couch. She looked down at her blond teammate, his gangly legs and arms spread over her parents' couch like a comatose golden monkey, and affection filled her heart. Naruto was a brat through and through, but he was really quite adorable sometimes, and he was her best friend after Ino. Sakura leaned down over the snoring young man, kissed his forehead, and dropped a handful of ice down his shirt.

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.

"Oh god Neji _why_?" Uzumaki cried, jumping up from the couch with his teeth chattering, rubbing his arms up and down.

Well _that _was an interesting reaction.

"Why is it always snow with that guy?" Naruto muttered, shivering and looking around for his socks. Sakura had no answer for that question either, because she'd never seen Neji have anything to do with snow.

"I don't think Neji even has any ice attacks," Sakura said, holding out Naruto's shoes. Her teammate took them with a grateful nod.

"He does, I know it. He's keeping it secret so that the next time we fight he can surprise me and freeze me to death. It's completely unexpected, completely out of character. Sneaky bastard."

"You're still sore because he blames you for Hinata dumping you, I see."

Naruto's baby blue eyes watered, and he grabbed Sakura's hands in his, like a penitent pilgrim. "It's just not fair, Sakura! She dumped me, broke my heart, and he acts like its _my_ fault. He follows me everywhere and he tried to kill me twice last week, I swear to the Hokage."

Sakura shook her head, and smiled placating as she unwrapped herself from his grip. "Can't help you. Neji doesn't even like his cousin, so whatever you did to make him think he needs vengeance on her behalf must have been bad."

"I don't want to get into it," he mumbled. When Sakura patted his shoulder, he plastered rueful a smile on his face. "Go get dressed, birthday girl! I'm taking you out for ramen."

Lunch with Naruto was a pleasant distraction. He typically kept conversation light and while his eating habits still resembled the orphan hooligan she grew up with, her friend had finally learned to slow down enough to enjoy company and noodles at the same pace. Their easy discussion allowed Sakura to devote the remainder of her thoughts to an idea she'd been flirting with since the party last night, dangling it before her imagination as she pondered the ups and downs.

The idea was simple, straightforward, and preposterous: Haruno Sakura wanted to make Kakashi, her erstwhile genin instructor and former squad leader, fall in madly love with her.

When they'd stood together in the kitchen, the noise of festivity swirling in the background, she had observed an aberration in his behavior. It niggled at her mind for the rest of the evening and into the morning: something about the way Kakashi approached her had been deeply different from all their previous encounters, going back years. The difference was fundamental, vast, and Sakura was almost frightened to know it was possible. He'd not just approached her as a congratulatory friend or mentor; he'd approached her for the sole sake of spending time with her. The man had stood in her kitchen and looked at Sakura just to _look_ at her—and he'd never done anything like that before.

Chuunin Haruno Sakura was not merely the Hokage's apprentice because of her refined chakra control; she was a genius who'd beaten Uchiha Sasuke more than once in grades and who could survive a game of Go with Shikamaru with her pride intact, even if she only managed to achieve a draw. She didn't like to flatter herself too often, but she was brilliant and she knew it. So figuring out this puzzle? It was not a difficult challenge. The simplest answer was usually the right one, and Sakura knew the simplest answer was that Hatake Kakashi, for whatever reason, was vulnerable to her.

The rush of power she got from that thought was incredible.

She'd seen it in his eyes, felt it in his fingertips. She hadn't imagined his reactions or exaggerated them through beer goggles. She didn't know why or when the change in him had occurred, and she did not particularly care to know. Kakashi had allowed himself to be physically vulnerable around her and Sakura instinctively knew it would happen again. She could _make_ it happen any time she wanted.

The more she picked at it, the further around the edges of logic she nibbled, the more appealing the idea of making him fall for her sounded. What she had here was a unique opportunity. Kakashi was older, attractive, single, and uncomplicated. He didn't have relationships, he had flings with his hand and sometimes with civilians, a fact she only knew because she was best friends with Ino, matriarch of the gossip surrounding their circle of friends and colleagues. Sakura had never felt desired by a man like him before, much less a man she'd known when she was a child, was it only five years ago? It seemed so much longer, and they were all so different now.

This could be a challenge for her, a self-imposed mission. She'd been lonely since her previously disastrous relationship had fallen apart, and she'd been itching to assert her independence. She was getting her own place, she was almost ready to try for jounin, and it was about time she got a lover.

"Kakashi would be perfect for it."

"Perfect for what?" Naruto asked. Sakura stamped down a blush.

"Nothing, just a thought I had for something Tsunade-sama was asking me about. Mission stuff." Simple, clean, boring. It was a beautiful lie. "Are you finished? I want to meet up with Ino today," she added.

Naruto belched, and Sakura took that as her cue to leave.

A few hours later she sat in the back room of the Yamanaka florist house with Ino, spilling the entire story with the grace of a toddler dropping a cup of milk down her shirt.

"And that's when I decided to make him fall in love with me," she finished. Sharing with the gregarious girl was a risk, but a relatively small one, as they had come to a truce in the last few years.

Ino was more than a little shocked to hear the plan. She pursed her lips and looked at Sakura sideways. "Kakashi-sensei?"

"Shh! You're too loud, Ino. Anyway, yes—Kakashi."

"I know you're still smarting," the other girl replied, "over your break-up with L—"

"Hey!"

"With you know who, but I don't think going for someone older is going to solve your problems."

But what did Ino know? Ino had never dated anyone older than twenty.

"I don't have 'problems'. Remember? That was several months ago and I dropped _him_. I just don't want you saying his name because whenever one of us does, it seems to magically summon him."

"You can't change the topic on me. I mean, this is crazy! This is the craziest plan you've ever had. I know you like chasing the unattainable but chasing your sensei is taking it too far. Teams get destroyed by this kind of stuff."

Sakura shook her head vigorously, tapping her fingers on the arm of her chair. "We haven't been on a team together in two and a half years, since Naruto's return. You didn't see it, Ino," she replied. "The way he _looked_ at me."

"Like he wanted to eat you?"

"No. Yes. No, no. Not like he wanted to eat me. It was more like he was trying to look past my eyes and find something there that he didn't know how to talk about. And he held my hand like it was a rare, beautiful weapon and he was window-shopping."

"Maybe he thought you had a hangnail," Ino said dryly.

"I don't know what he thought," Sakura moaned, and cupped her chin in her fingers. "But I know that I can make him look at me like that again. I _want_ to."

"He's a lot older than us," her friend said. "Not just a couple years older—a lot older. More than ten."

"So he's an older guy," she shrugged, like this fact was as relevant to the issue as his way of drinking coffee.

"Kakashi isn't 'a guy', Sakura, he's a _man_."

Sakura pointed and herself and Ino, then made a sort of squiggly, up and down gesture that seemed to encompass the fact that they both had boobs and legs. "What's your point?"

The blonde shinobi held up her hands in defeat. "Don't listen to me then! Don't listen to your poor best friend, who only has your interests at heart, and who also happens to have had more experience at all the dirty parts of the game. I'll just watch this parade from the sidelines. You go have fun making out with grandpa."

Grandpa? Sakura scowled. "I'll have you know, Kakashi is a bona fied hottie."

"Had to take his temperature already?" Ino smirked. "Did you give him his daily arthritis regimen, too?"

Sakura playfully punched her, and countered, "Just wait, you'll see it all happen. He's going to fall at my feet."

"Like a geriatric?" 


	9. And it'll always be good to me, Always

**Comments:** It's been a long time, I know. I have had a lot of trouble with this chapter, with finding the right tone. I hope you enjoy it anyway, and I can promise that I won't wait a billion years before I do the next update. As a note, some of you might notice some references to Chapter 1 in the following scene. Thanks go out to JadeSabre301 for helping me spot-check this chapter, and for her enthusiastic support.

**On Titles:** Until now the chapter titles have been lyrics from the Chapter 1's song "XXX" by Crushing Velvet. I ran out of verses from that song, so from now on they'll probably take from the song I'm listening to when I write the chapter.

**Soundtrack for this chapter:** The White Stripes – "Good To Me"

* * *

**Lucid**

_9__ – __And it'll always be good to me, Always be good to me_

* * *

After her conspiracy confession to Ino, Sakura used the rest of the weekend to develop The Plan.

The Plan was a list of tactics and techniques, more than half of them recommended by her friend. Sakura had included some of her own ideas, and she felt the end result was a polished work of analysis and hypothesis. Sakura was sure—pretty sure—that Kakashi was attracted to her, so the cruel, confidence-killing part of the plan was already over. She didn't have to work hard to make him notice her, because based on his behavior the last two weeks Kakashi _noticed_ so many things about Haruno Sakura that he might have been conducting research project. The trick now was to get him to notice her the right way. The fun way, she thought. _The...available way._

By Tuesday afternoon she felt comfortable enough to give it a try. First step: be everywhere. Keep yourself on his mind at all times. She started at the source. After banging on his door eight times, it opened and a sullen looking Hatake Kakashi greeted her.

"You missed your routine immunization check-up at the hospital," Sakura announced. "You could be punished for that."

Sakura watched carefully, but Kakashi didn't move a muscle. He held himself still—_unnaturally still_—as he said, "Punished?"

She gave him a cat-grin. "Fiscally. Don't get immunized, don't get paid." Inwardly, Sakura was starting to get nervous. She'd thought for sure the word "punished" would get some kind of reaction out of him. How was he so cool again, all of a sudden?

"Did you draw the short straw?"

"My shift is beginning in half an hour. I volunteered to leave a few minutes early to grab you and take you myself."

"Take me," Kakashi echoed, dry as paper. Sakura kept her smile. This conversation had gone on for three minutes already, which was right on schedule. A little more prompting and he'd be trailing her to the hospital. She couldn't say exactly why she was confident of this; she just knew it would happen.

_Lean in a little more, like Ino said, it will only help._ She bent her body forward, so that she almost passed the invisible wall of his doorway. Penetrate his personal space.

"You know, since you're a Class-S delinquent when it comes to medical policies. Someone has to make sure you show up, and now that we're friends, that's me! I don't know why you're afraid of hospitals." Something...there—THERE! She saw him twitch. He definitely reacted. _Finally_, he was being entirely too stiff and weird this morning. _I need him to relax around me a little more._ Comfort was the key.

But not too much comfort, of course. Sakura reached out and grabbed Kakashi's forearm. "Come," she said, and tugged to get him out of the house. Sakura almost stumbled when he came along too. Willingly! She'd been expecting more resistance. _But this was good!_ In fact, this was excellent. She dropped his arm and instead pressed on the center of his back, between the shoulder blades. She propelled him forward so as to send a clear, medical message that he was not going to be allowed to bail on her. Sakura might have been younger, and of lesser rank, but she had Your Shinobi Health Care Policy on her side, all capitalizations included.

"Why are you so chipper?" Kakashi asked as they turned onto the street. Sakura shoved her hands into her pockets, but was careful to walk closer to his side than normal. Not quite close enough to be obvious to everyone else who passed, but enough that her elbow sometimes brushed his arm. _Establish and maintain physical contact_, Ino had said. Start small, and build.

"I had an amazing birthday weekend, and tomorrow I am going to scout out my own place. I want something with lots of, hm, size. Something big. Then again, I'll probably only be able to afford something small and cramped and hot."

"Why hot?" said Kakashi after a brief silence. Whether he was quiet because they were crossing a lane that swung past the memorial or because of what she'd said, Sakura wasn't sure.

"Air conditioning is expensive. For that, I'd have to move in with someone."

"Ah. Of course."

"At least until I take the jounin exam. In three months I'll qualify for the higher-paying missions."

Kakashi raised his only visible eyebrow, and said, "You're that certain you'll pass?"

Sakura moved closer and said in a stage whisper, "I have a secret weapon."

"Oh? What kind."

"Pure pernicious tenacity, the direct result of five years on a team with Naruto."

Kakashi conceded this experience was a leg-up in any competition, and their walk continued for about a mile and a half in pleasant, unforced conversation. Sakura did most of the talking, but when he contributed his answers were witty, frequently laced with a twisted, cynical kind of optimism which would have sounded contradictory coming from anyone else.

Sakura found herself smiling genuinely, enjoying the walk. Kakashi was an easy-going guy, if somewhat recalcitrant, and today he seemed less annoying than usual. She remembered that he used to annoy her all the time, though looking back the reason for thinking so was a bit…fuzzy. It'd had a lot to do with his tardiness, and—if she thought about it objectively—the fact that he always put her in a pairing with Naruto instead of Sasuke.

Then there was the lying, of course. That had positively _riled_ her as a genin. Back when Sakura believed all adults should be somehow obligated to live up to the label. If Kakashi were lying now, well, they weren't exactly talking about anything important, so she'd let him off the hook. Nevertheless, it was time to up the game a notch; they were getting nearer to the main medical building. One last block and her opportunity would be gone.

She stopped him on the sidewalk with a hand lightly pressed to the place where collarbone met shoulder. Here goes.

"Wait a second," said Sakura. "There's something on your neck."

She noted the frown assembling behind Kakashi's mask, and acted. The young medic-nin moved her fingers up to touch the limited amount of skin that sat exposed between Kakashi's cloth-covered chin and his jacket collar. _Now, before he thinks about your motives! _ Sakura brushed lightly at the area with the pads of her fingertips, standing on her tip-toes and pouting in concentration. She leaned on the older man, tilted her neck so he could see her own skin, and tugged his collar down.

And he let her do it. _He's letting me do this._ On the street, in front of people, Hatake Kakashi was allowing Sakura to touch him. Her free hand squeezed his nearest elbow for balance.

"It's some kind of insect bite, I think." Keep going, _keep going!_ Lean closer, closer—oh wow, he smells like beef jerky—_come on_... "I can't quite tell. It might—"

One moment Kakashi was practically supporting her full weight, the next the man had vanished and Sakura had to do some fancy twists to avoid falling over. She looked around for her prey, and spotted the double doors to the hospital ahead. One swung lightly on its hinges.

Ahah! At least he didn't ditch his immunization appointment. Sakura had strong feelings about a preventative approach to health care. She clapped her hands together once and rocked on her heels.

"Well," she said, and relished the satisfaction in her voice. "That was educational."


End file.
